Demon Lord
|rarity = Very Rare |casting_cost = |upkeep_cost = per turn |research_cost = |num_figures = |moves = |melee = |ranged = |defense = |resist = |hits = |abilities = Ranged Attack x8 +30% To Hit Summon Demons x3 Poison Immunity Weapon Immunity Illusions Immunity Cold Immunity Death Immunity Cause Fear Life Steal -5 }} The Demon Lord is a type of Fantastic Unit featured in Master of Magic. Demon Lords belong to the Realm, and may be summoned using a Summoning Spell of the same name. Demon Lords are powerful and versatile creatures that are adept at both single combat and supporting large armies. They can engage their enemies either at long or close range, and can gate in lesser Demons to aid them in battle. The Fantastic Unit Physical Description Demon Lords are grotesque abominations from the deepest bowels of hell. The Demon Lord has an obese, dark-pink humanoid body, and a terrifying face resembling a cross between an insect and a pig. Two great wings keep the creature aloft, though its body is probably also supported by magical energy. It is several times larger than a man. The Demon Lord is a . Attack Properties The Demon Lord is a powerful combatant, executing both its Melee- and Ranged Magical Attacks with deadly accuracy. In close quarters, it attacks with a strength of , enjoying a massive bonus of . It deals, on average, points of "raw" per attack - easily enough to injure even heavily armored targets. Its Ranged Attack is somewhat weaker in comparison, with a strength of only , but this too benefits from the same bonus, and will thus deal an average of points. As a , it also ignores range penalties, meaning that it can be fired with the same efficiency regardless of the distance between the Demon Lord and its target. Although the Demon Lord can use this Ranged Attack 8 times per battle, which is twice the average for units, it needs to be noted that, because of a quirk in the rules governing Attack Strength, the Demon Lord will not use this attack by default on adjacent targets. It will use its instead, which can have some unwanted consequences, especially in the original game, where it can trigger a fairly serious bug described below. The easiest way to circumvent this behaviour is by casting the spell, as it will cause the Demon Lord's Ranged Attack Strength to become higher than half of its Melee Strength, negating the condition that normally triggers the Attack Type override for adjacent targets. The Demon Lord possesses the Cause Fear ability - its mere presence is so frightening, that enemies need to overcome their terror to be able to even strike at it in melee combat. However, this effect has major bugs in the latest official version of the game, and is actually more of a hindrance than a benefit. The original intention was that whenever the Demon Lord is engaged in melee (including Counter Attacks), the opponent would have to make a Resistance check for each of its , and any that fail would not participate in dealing Melee Damage or delivering Touch Attacks if they had any. Unfortunately, due to coding mistakes, this ability has no actual effect at all when the Demon Lord is Counter Attacking and, what's worse, if it initiates the attack, and any enemy fail their Resistance rolls, the Demon Lord itself will not perform its melee- or Touch Attack. This bug is fixed in the unofficial patches though, starting with Insecticide. The Demon Lord does have a Touch Attack too, and a very useful one at that. Life Steal is affixed to every attack that it makes, including its - forcing the opponent to try and resist, or suffer additional Life Stealing Damage. The Demon Lord's ability carries a penalty, making it almost certain that most targets will take at least some , as the actual amount dealt is determined by the difference between a failed roll, and the result that would have been needed for success. Even if an enemy unit has , they will only emerge unharmed on a roll of 5''' or lower. On a roll of '''8, for example, they would take 8 - 5 = points of . This Damage Type also has some special properties. For one, each point inflicted on the enemy will also remove a point of from the Demon Lord itself! If it is undamaged, it will gain temporary extra instead. These only last until the end of the battle though, and do not carry over to the overland map. Life Stealing Damage is also always considered to be of the "Create Undead" type, which can cause slain enemy units to rise as Undead to serve the Demon Lord's master after the battle. This happens if the destroyed unit has suffered at least as much of this type of as regular Damage Points, and more of it than any Irreversible Damage; although Heroes, combat summons, and creatures are exempt from this effect. The ability itself is also associated with the Realm, and may trigger conditional bonuses and immunities that make some targets harder, or even impossible to affect. Finally, the Demon Lord's army needs to win the battle for this to work at all as well, and there must be space left in its stack for any risen units. Defensive Properties The Demon Lord has one of the highest Defense ratings of any Fantastic Unit, at . This makes it very hard for enemy units with low Attack Strength scores to do any to it, since it will block about points on average from any Conventional Damage attack. Even if some does get through though, the Demon Lord also has , allowing it to take quite a few hits before being destroyed, which can give it time to restore itself with Life Steal. Although the Demon Lord possesses Weapon Immunity, this will typically not benefit the creature, as its Defense is already , which is the same as what it would gain from this ability. However, it may still trigger under special circumstances, such as when fighting Armor Piercing Normal Units with , or if the Demon Lord's Defense is reduced in some way, for instance, by a spell. Like most other creatures from the Realm, the Demon Lord also possesses a variety of other immunities: Poison Immunity, Illusions Immunity, Cold Immunity and Death Immunity. These render it completely invulnerable to a wide array of Unit Curses and Special Damage attacks. And when that is not enough, the Demon Lord possesses one of the highest Resistance scores of any creature: . This means that even effects that can get through its immunities will still have great difficulty affecting the Demon Lord, and have no chance of success at all unless they inflict a Resistance penalty of at least ! Other Properties The Demon Lord is a unit, though not a terribly fast one. It can maneuver fairly well, which is useful for picking good targets to attack and avoiding others. It also can't be voluntarily attacked by most units. Unfortunately however, considering the Cause Fear bug described above, this fact actually often works against the Demon Lord - if its only combat option left is Melee, it may have significant difficulty fighting weak units with low Resistance scores in the official game. As with most other creatures, the Demon Lord also does not heal naturally, and may only restore lost through its Life Steal ability or a spell. Summoning Demons The Demon Lord has a unique ability that allows it to gate in lesser Demons to do its bidding. Summon Demons can be activated 3 times per battle using the "Spell" action. Doing so summons such a creature to a random tile near the middle of the map, and will bind it to remain until combat is finished. While not as impressive as their summoner, Demons are nonetheless fairly powerful Melee Attack units that are quite capable of engaging low-tier enemy units on their own, and may gang up to weaken or destroy even stronger foes. They , possess Weapon- and Missile Immunity, and have all the immunities common to creatures as well. Summoning a Demon uses up all of the Demon Lord's remaining Movement Allowance for the turn, but is not actually considered as casting a spell, and thus may not be countered by effects such as , or the dispelling aura of magical Nodes. However, this action can only be performed if the Demon Lord does still have Movement Points left. It's also important to note that the game has some problems checking the eligibility of using this ability with respect to the amount of units already present on the battlefield. Since this count is limited to 18 live units total (considering both sides), and the game will crash if there are any more, summoning a Demon while already controlling 9 units is not recommended, even if the computer does allow it. Basic Tactics The Demon Lord is quite versatile in combat. It can act both as a Melee- or Ranged Attack unit. In fact, because of the correlation between its Attack Strength scores, it offers the player better control over which Attack Type to use than other similar units. This can be very important in the official game, where the Demon Lord will struggle to destroy low-tier units in melee if they can't attack it voluntarily. It needs to use either its Ranged Attacks or Summon Demons against such foes. Coincidentally, deciding which one of these to open the battle with is often the biggest decision to make for the Demon Lord. If the enemy has either only strong or only weaker units, then this may not matter, but if it has both, then softening the stronger ones with Demons may be a better option, as it can allow saving the Ranged Attacks to use on the weaker units to regain for the Demon Lord while engaged in melee with a more powerful opponent. On the other hand, if the enemy has a strong ranged unit that needs to be taken out first, it may fall quicker to Ranged Attacks than the time it would take for the Demons to reach it. Enemy Demon Lords Demon Lords are quite rare, especially when compared to other units. Nonetheless, they can occasionally be found in strong Encounter Zones and Towers of Wizardry. Most often, the encounter will include a single Demon Lord surrounded by low-level creatures, especially Ghouls. The first problem when engaging a Demon Lord is the Demons it will likely summon - these can be quite dangerous even on their own. Unlike the Demon Lord itself, they possess Missile Immunity, which can be a problem for even strong troops that could otherwise win a ranged battle against the Demon Lord by itself. Should the Demon Lord be surrounded by a full host of 8 units, it is often better to try and kill it first for this reason alone - the computer will never try to use Summon Demons when it already has 9 units on the field. Another issue is the creature's Life Steal which, with its penalty, can get through even fairly high Resistance scores, allowing the Demon Lord to regain health both close up and at range. This can be offset somewhat by using spells or abilities that increase the of the entire army, such as Prayermaster. If the Demon Lord can be stopped from restoring itself, then really the only thing left to contend with is its high combat attributes. This is probably best countered with strong Melee Attackers, or alternatively well-armored or units, as these work equally well against both the Demon Lord and its summoned minions. Offensive spells are usually not a good choice unless they deal Doom Damage, or can be empowered to a very high Attack Strength. The vast majority of Unit Curses and Special Damage attacks will also completely fail to affect the Demon Lord due to its immunities and high score. Enhancing the player's own army is thus typically a better use of their . Ability Overview Ranged Attack x8 * This unit may use a instead of a Melee Attack 8 times in each battle. Once the unit's ammo is expended, it must resort to Melee Attacks. +30% To Hit * This unit has an extra to hit its target with every die of its Attack Rolls. This improves its statistical chance to inflict more with each attack it makes. Summon Demons x3 * This unit may summon up to 3 separate units of Demons during each battle. This costs no , but ends the unit's turn immediately. * A summoned Demon appears in a random tile somewhere on the Demon Lord's half of the battlefield, but usually close to the center of the map. * A Demon remains only until the end of the battle (if it survives that long). It will then disappear automatically. Weapon Immunity * This unit is considered to have a Defense score of against attacks made by Normal Units with . Poison Immunity * This unit cannot be hurt by Poison Damage. It will automatically pass any roll to avert such damage. Illusions Immunity * Illusion Damage inflicted on this unit does not bypass its . The unit gets to make its Defense Rolls as normal. * During combat, this unit will spot all enemy Invisible creatures regardless of how close they are. Those creatures become semi-visible on the screen, and may be targeted by spells like any other unit. * This unit may not be targeted by , , , or . Cold Immunity * This unit is considered to have a Defense score of against Cold Damage. It will almost never be hurt by the and spells. Death Immunity * This unit will not be affected by most spells and abilities associated with the Realm. Cause Fear * When this unit engages in melee combat (including Counter Attacks), its opponent must make as many Resistance checks as it has . For each failed roll, one of its will not be able to deliver any Melee Damage or associated Touch Attacks. Other attacks, such as , , or Gaze, are unaffected. * This effect does nothing against units with Death Immunity, and is associated with the Realm for determining conditional modifiers. * This effect is severely bugged in the latest official game version, but is fixed from the unofficial Insecticide patch onwards. Life Steal -5 * Whenever this unit makes a Melee Attack, Ranged Attack, or Counter Attack, it also executes a Touch Attack delivering Life Stealing Damage with a Resistance penalty of . The target has to make one Resistance check, or suffer an additional amount of equal to how much it failed its check by. * For each point of done by this ability, the Demon Lord also regains . If it is already at full health, it also gains a temporary maximum until the end of the battle. * This ability deals "Create Undead Damage", which has the capacity of raising slain units as Undead under its possessor's control. This requires that the Demon Lord's army wins the battle, has room left in its stack, and that the destroyed unit suffered more of this type of than Irreversible-'', and at least as much as regular Damage Points. The Summoning Spell Usage Demon Lord may only be cast overland, for the base Casting Cost of . Upon successfully casting the spell, the new Demon Lord unit will appear in the Town currently containing the Wizard's Summoning Circle, with full Movement Allowance, and may move and/or attack immediately as necessary. To keep the Demon Lord in play, its controller is required to pay an Upkeep Cost of per turn. This is drawn automatically from the caster's pool at the beginning of each turn while the unit exists. Failure to pay this Upkeep due to lack of will lead to the Demon Lord immediately disappearing, along with any Unit Enchantments currently affecting it. However, this upkeep is ''for the unit, not for the spell: Summoning Spells can not be dispelled by the enemy once cast. Naturally though, if the unit is destroyed, then it is gone from the world entirely, and there is no further need to pay its Upkeep Cost. Units summoned on the overland map may also be dismissed manually from their unit statistics window the same way as any other overland unit (during their controller's turn, while not in combat). Acquisition As a Very Rare Spell of the Realm, Demon Lord may become available to any Wizard who acquires at least Spellbooks. With any less, the spell can normally not be learned during the campaign. This is the minimum requirement for it to be traded for, appear in Treasure, or be found in the spoils of victory when conquering the Fortress of a rival Wizard who already knows it. The base chance for Demon Lord to be researchable (at some point) in the campaign is roughly 10% (with books), which gradually increases with the amount of Spellbooks possessed or found during gameplay. With or more, the spell is certain to show up sooner or later, unless acquired from another source. It has a Research Cost of , although its research is quicker for Wizards possessing the Sage Master, and/or Conjurer Retorts; or a bookshelf containing or more. Demon Lord may not be acquired at the start of the game, regardless of the amount of books selected from the starting picks. It must always be either researched or found. However, a bug exists in the official game, that may occasionally allow Demon Lord to be researched with only books despite its Rarity. This can happen if, and only if, the second Spellbook comes from Treasure, as it then allows a random Very Rare Spell to be researched, which has a flat 10% chance of being this spell. This oversight is corrected in the Unofficial Patch 1.50. Known Bugs There are two bugs associated with the Demon Lord's abilities. The first one, while it can crash the game, can easily be avoided. When using Summon Demons, the latest official game version fails to check whether there's room in the player's army, and will allow summoning the Demon even with 9 units. However, should at any point there be over 18 total units on the field (including the opponent's), the game will instantly lock up. The Unofficial Patch 1.51 resolves this issue by not allowing the Demon to appear if the player already controls 9 units, similar to how other combat summons work already. The Cause Fear ability is also severely bugged in version 1.31. Firstly, when the Demon Lord is Counter Attacking, the effect does not work at all. However, when it is initiating a Melee Attack, it is instead also affected in a rather peculiar way. If any of the opposing fail to resist, the Demon Lord is applied its own fear effect, and will not deliver Melee or Touch Attack damage. Technically, the attacking unit is simply also denied as many attacks as the defender, but because the Demon Lord is a , this means that in practice, even a single failed roll on the defender's part will prevent it from doing any . This can have a tremendous effect, if the Demon Lord is fighting a low-resistance . Let's take Pikemen for example. They consist of and have a Resistance score of . There's a 98.3 % chance that at least one Pikemen will fail its roll. In this case the Demon Lord won't do any damage. As a result, the Pikemen will most likely kill the Demon Lord in melee combat, even if it may take them some time to do so. This bug is fixed in the unofficial Insecticide (1.40) patch. Category:Units Category:Fantastic Creatures Category:Death